nephew's statement, which probably concluded with an intimation that Isaac did not know there was any other object in Jacob's journey than to obtain a wife from the house of Nahor. Among people of such habits of life as we are now describing, it would be a reproach to any man, when on a visit, not to take his full share in the occupations and pursuits of the family; and the estimation in which he is held will be proportioned to the disposition and power which he manifests of making himself useful to his friends. Jacob accordingly exerted himself, during the first month of his stay, with such good effect as made a strong impression upon his uncle, who was too shrewd a man not to perceive that, probably from his having spent all his life in tents, and latterly in active superintendence of his father's flocks, Jacob had such a very superior knowledge of pastoral affairs as would render his services of much value. Therefore, at the end of the month, he spoke to him, observing that since he seemed likely to make some stay, he was unwilling to take advantage of their relationship to receive the benefit of his assistance without price; but was anxious to make him whatever recompense he desired. Now Jacob during his stay had not been unobservant of Laban's two daughters. The eldest of them, Leah, was afflicted with a disorder in her eyes, but seems in other respects to have been an agreeable and sensible woman. The other, Rachel, whom he had first seen at the well, was very beautiful, and as she participated in the care of the flock, there were more points of sympathy between her and Jacob, and he saw more of her than of Leah, who, as the eldest daughter, was much engaged in the household affairs. On all these grounds it was natural that the heart of Jacob preferred Rachel; indeed, he loved her deeply.

To the fair, and even liberal proposal of Laban, his nephew therefore made answer, that he only desired that Rachel might be given to him for wife; and that, seeing he had not wherewith to pay for her the price which custom required, he was willing to give his services for seven years, as an equivalent. Laban readily closed with this proposal; and the arrangement thus made, is, to this day, not unusual in Syria with young men who have nothing but their services to offer the family from which they desire a wife.

Usage required that a month should pass between the formation and completion of such an agreement; and when the month was expired, Jacob demanded his wife. On this, Laban assembled a large party of his friends, to keep the wedding-feast, which, it seems, even at this early date, lasted during a week. On the first evening, Laban led his veiled daughter to the chamber of her husband, which was left in darkness: thus it was not until the morning that Jacob discovered that the wily Laban, instead of giving him his beloved Rachel, had brought him his less favoured daughter, Leah. This was enough to throw a meeker man than Jacob into a passion; but, on being reproached with his conduct, Laban coolly answered, that it was not the custom of the country to give the younger daughter in marriage before the elder. This is so conformable to Oriental ideas, that it is very likely to have been true; but it was his duty to have told this to his nephew when the agreement was made, instead of forcing upon him, for a wife, a woman he did not wish to marry, in the place of one whom he truly loved. But his real object was to get rid first of his least attractive daughter, as well as to secure a longer claim upon the valued services of his sister's son. Accordingly he added, that, when he had completed the matrimonial week due to Leah, there would be no objection to his taking Rachel also, provided he would undertake to serve another seven years for her sake. Circumstanced as he was by the guile of Laban, Jacob was compelled to agree to this; and we are touchingly told that the further seven years which he served for Rachel, "seemed to him but as a few days, for the love he had to her."

To Jacob's former indifference towards Leah, was now added the disgust which her evident participation in the fraud practised upon him was calculated to inspire. But it turned out that Leah had a ground of exultation over her favoured rival, in the fact that she bore four sons to her husband, while her sister was barren. Finding this to be the case, Rachel bethought herself of giving to Jacob her handmaid, named Bilhah, whom she had received from her father on her marriage, under the notion that the children which this woman might bear would be counted as hers. It will be remembered that Sarah had given her handmaid, Hagar, to

Lest any reader should be offended at the use of this word, we may mention that this is the correct and formal term for the consideration which the bridegroom is obliged to make to the family from which he takes a daughter or sister.

Abraham, under a similar idea. The plan so far succeeded, that Bilhah became the mother of two sons, both of whom received from Rachel names expressive of her exultation. Leah, finding how her sister's plan answered, and that she had herself ceased to bear children, persuaded Jacob to take also her handmaid, Zilpah, and by her he had two sons; then Leah herself recommenced bearing, and had two sons and a daughter. At last the cries of Rachel herself were heard in heaven; her womb was opened, and she conceived, and bare a sonJoseph, the favoured and beautiful, who fills so large a place in the history of the patriarchs. Thus the fourteen years passed away, during which Jacob must have been much disturbed by the bickerings and heart-burnings of his wives; and at the end of which he found himself the father of eleven sons and a daughter.*

Jacob's full term of service being now expired, he applied to Laban for leave to return to the land of Canaan with his wives and children. But Laban begged him to prolong his stay, "for I have found by experience," said he, "that Jehovah hath blessed me for thy sake." This gave Jacob the opportunity of hinting that he fully knew the value of his own services to his uncle, whom he reminded of the comparatively small extent of his pastoral property on his own arrival, and how amazingly it had since been increased-not, indeed, through his exertions, though nothing had been wanting on his part, but through the Lord's blessing on his account. He added that it was now become his duty to provide for his own house also. In answer to this, Laban intimated his willingness to grant him whatever remuneration for his future services he might himself require. Jacob then made the extraordinary proposal that, seeing shepherds were usually paid for their services from the produce of the flock, his payment should consist of all the dark sheep and all the party-coloured goats which might hereafter be born in the flocks under his care, after all the animals so coloured in the existing flock were separated and committed to other hands. As the proportion of animals of such colours is in all cases small in a flock of Western Asia, and as the ordinary physical chances for the propagation of those colours seemed to be diminished by the proposed separation, Laban readily agreed to a plan which seemed so advantageous to himself. He made the stipulated separation, and gave the separated flock to the charge of his sons, directing them to keep at three days' distance from the pastures which Jacob frequented.

But Laban had soon occasion to find, if he had not found it before, that his nephew was fully a match for himself in craft. The terms of the agreement, as Laban understood them, must have been, that hazard, operating with certain drawbacks, would adequately remunerate Jacob for his care of the flock of which his uncle was the proprietor. The intention, therefore, with which Rebekah's son made his proposal, as indicated by its subsequent execution, speaks far more in behalf of his superior knowledge of the shepherd's art, and is much more in unison with his early operations upon Esau and upon his own father, than it is moral, or, in any sense, honest. His profound knowledge of the habits of the animals which form the pastor's wealth, put him in possession of the fact, that the powerful thirst which, in those warm climates, the animals necessarily feel by the time they are brought to the wells for water, makes the time of drinking one of the highest excitement to them, as manifested by the disposition which, in the proper season, they then show to the act of propagating their kind. This state of excitement lays their imaginations open-so to speak-to receive impressions from the slightest and apparently the most inadequate causes; and that when the impression has been received, it may operate upon the colour of the issue of those animals in which colour varies, few physiologists will question. To avail himself of his knowledge of these facts, Jacob took rods of the poplar, hazel, and plane, and peeled white streaks in them by laying bare the whiteness of the rods. Thus prepared, he set them in the troughs from which the flocks were watered; and the unusual appearance at that well-known and favourite place could not fail to draw their attention strongly at that most exciting timewhen they drank and also coupled-which we have indicated. The result was, that the

* It may be useful to add here their names, with the years of their birth (stated with reference to the age of their father) annexed, as settled by Dr. Hales, that the reader may be clearly aware of their relative ages. By Leah-Reuben, 78, Simeon, 80, Levi, 82, Judah, 83; by Bilhah-Dan, 84, Naphtali, 85; by Zilpah-Gad, 86, Asher, 87; by Leah again-Issachar, 88, Zebulon, 89, Dinah, 90; by Rachel-Joseph, 91, Benjamin, 104. We add the name of Benjamin to complete the list, though he was not born till some years after the date at which we are now arrived.

young which were conceived under such circumstances were of the colours which Jacob required, and which he was entitled to set apart as his own property; and as he only tried this operation upon the stronger animals of the flock, leaving the weak ones to the course of nature, it happened that not only did his share become very large, but the stronger animals of the flock were his, and the weaker Laban's.

This transaction has been a subject of various and warm discussion. The natural adequacy of the cause to produce the assigned effect has been denied by parties entirely opposed to each other, by sceptics, who endeavour to throw doubt on the truth of the scriptural narrative, and by truly pious persons, who believe that the result proceeded from a miraculous interposition. of Divine power, and that the operations were in themselves nothing but as sanctified and directed by God. To both parties we would say, that we much doubt whether they and the authorities on which they depend knew so much of the nature of sheep and goats as did Jacob, who for nearly a century had lived constantly among the flocks; and that a denial ought to be made with diffidence which is founded on observations made in European countries, where, for the most part, the animals themselves are so differently circumstanced, and their natural characteristics less actively developed than under the skies of Syria and Mesopotamia, and in the broad and warm plains in which they feed, and under the modes of treatment to which they are subject there. And to the latter we would beg to remark, that we are not told that God did direct Jacob to take this course; and the deep reverence with which we regard that great and holy name makes us shrink with intense repugnance from such attempts to exonerate Jacob at the expense of making Him a party in this most fraudulent proceeding. It is by such things as this-by attempts to clear the characters of the eminent persons of Biblical history from all stain, by connecting the Divine sanction with their most weak or culpable actions-that more real and vital injury has been done to the cause of truth than by all the sneers and insinuations which avowed scorners of revelation ever uttered. For ourselves, this proceeding seems to bear, from beginning to end, the aspect of a complicated and well-planned piece of dishonesty. The proposal was Jacob's own, when Laban left him the choice of his own terms; and the very singularity of it suggests that he was well aware that he possessed the means of obtaining a far greater benefit from it than any one else could have supposed likely, or than would have been possible under the operation of ordinary circumstances; and the real dishonesty of employing artificial means for his purpose, is greatly enhanced by his measure for securing all the stronger animals for himself, and leaving the weak to the original owner of the flock. The real excuse for Jacob, and for many of the unseemly actions into which some most venerable persons in the Hebrew history did at times fall, lies in this-first, that those eminent persons whom we fondly picture to ourselves as somewhat more than men, were men only, and often, as in themselves, very weak men; and, secondly, that they were Orientals;—for it must not be concealed, that in the East, however pure may be the religious principle, and lofty the religious feeling, and however strong the pride of honour, there is now, and ever has been, such a weakness of the moral sense as is not without much pain and difficulty comprehended by those who have from infancy breathed in a moral atmosphere which Christianity has purified, and which, by its insensible influences, keeps in a state of moral healthiness even those who have not found therein the breath of life.

We are thoroughly convinced that, at the present day, there are, in Western Asia, and, least of all among the Bedouins, very few men, even among persons of character and station, who would not to the end of their lives make their boast of such splendid exploits in overreaching as those which passed between Laban and Jacob. They would be incapable of seeing anything more in them than evidences of their own ability and cleverness; and their auditors, labouring under the same incapacity, would, to a man, listen with deep interest and admiration. The story of Laban's cheating Jacob into taking the wrong wife would be received with rapture; and Jacob himself would be regarded rather with contempt than pity, until the story of his dealings with the sheep and goats intrusted to his care, which would not fail to be heard with shouts of delight, should turn the scale of admiration in his favour.

Now, from this time forward, Jacob "increased exceedingly," and in the course of about six years, he "had much cattle, and men-servants, and women-servants, and camels, and

asses." This prosperity excited the envy of Laban's family, and his sons were heard to say, "Jacob hath taken away all that was our father's; and of that which was our father's hath

he gotten all this glory." Laban, also, as might be expected, looked much less pleasant than in former times. Jacob, therefore, began to think it high time for him to return to the land of Canaan; and any doubts on the subject were removed by a Divine command to that effect. As he suspected that Laban would not let him withdraw unmolested with all the substance he had acquired, he resolved to go away without notice; and as his uncle was absent at a sheep-shearing, the opportunity was too favourable to be neglected. But first he consulted his wives, calling them forth into the fields, that they might not be overheard. He stated the matter fully to them, and had the satisfaction of finding that they entered entirely into his views. He therefore hastened his preparations for departure, in the course of which Rachel managed to secrete the small superstitious images, called Teraphim,() which belonged to her father. This she did, most probably, for the purpose of continuing in the strange land to which she was going, that superstitious use of them, on reference to them, in which she had been brought up.

All being ready, Jacob mounted his wives and children upon camels, and sped away toward the Euphrates with his flocks and herds, and all his substance. Having crossed the great river, he pursued his way for several days, until he arrived at the mountains of Gilead, where he pitched his tent, and resolved to spend the time usually allotted to rest.

[Teraphim?]

Laban did not hear of Jacob's flight until the third day after he started; but no sooner did he learn it, than he called together the men of his family and household, and commenced a rapid pursuit. That he persisted in this pursuit for seven days, during which he traversed all the distance from Chairan to the mountains of Gilead, shows the inveteracy of his purpose, which, it seems, was to take from Jacob all the property with which he had departed. But the night before he overtook the fugitive in Gilead, God appeared to him in a dream, and warned him, saying, “Take heed that thou speak not unto Jacob either good or bad." This changed his purpose entirely; for such an injunction as this, even Laban dared not disobey; but being now, as he knew, so near to his fugitive son-in-law and daughters, he determined still to follow and seek an interview with them.

When they met, some strong recrimination passed between Laban and Jacob. The former professed especial indignation that his daughters had been hurried away, "like captives taken with the sword, " and that no opportunity had been allowed him of giving one farewell kiss to them and their children, and of sending them away with music and with songs. And after declaring that only the vision of the past night prevented him from making use of the power he possessed, he added, with some heat, "And now though thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou sore longedst after thy father's house, yet wherefore hast thou stolen my gods?" Jacob, who was really ignorant of Rachel's theft, disavowed all knowledge of his teraphim, and declared that any one in whose possession they were found should be put to death. He also told Laban to go with his friends and make a strict search everywhere, to convince himself that there was nothing in the camp which he could justly claim for his own. His uncle took him at his word, and proceeded to make a very strict search. It seems that tents had only been pitched for the accommodation of the women and children, and that each of Jacob's wives had her separate tent. Laban went into each of them; but as he entered that of Rachel the last, she had an opportunity of hiding the teraphim under the pack of her camel, and seated herself upon it, as Bedouin women often do when enjoying rest on a journey: and when her father entered, she, with much more art than decorum, accounted for not rising to receive him, by such a statement as to her condition, as she knew would not only excuse her in that, but would induce him speedily to leave her tent. The plan answered; and Laban returned with a confession that he was unable to find that for which he sought. On this, Jacob, who before had been more disposed to excuse than vindicate his retreat, took a high tone in his turn. He stated how long and faithfully he had served Laban-fourteen years for his two daughters, and six years for his cattle, and alleged that his wages had several times been altered, when it was found that the agreed mode of payment proved more productive than had been foreseen. There are many traits in the preceding statement illustrative of the manners of that age and state of life; and one further passage is too descriptive of the condition and duties of an eastern shepherd to be other than literally given :-" That was torn of beasts," Jacob said, "I brought not unto thee: I bare the loss of it; of my hand didst thou require it, whether it was stolen by day, or stolen by night. Thus was I; in the day the drought consumed me and the frost by night; and my sleep departed from mine eyes." Laban did not attempt to answer; but gave a change to the subject by saying, that although he considered all he saw to be his, yet, as a father, he had no desire to interfere with the prosperity of his daughters and their children. He then proposed that they should enter into a covenant of future peace; and the mode in which it was formed and established will seem singularly interesting to those who inquire into old usages and the ideas connected with them-particularly those to which the name of Druidical has been assigned. Jacob, as he had done at Bethel, set up a tall stone on its end; and he also directed his people to collect large stones to form a heap. They all sat down then, and ate beside or upon this heap; it being a very early and still subsisting custom for those who entered into a friendly covenant to eat and drink together. And as it was also customary to impose significant and commemorative names upon the stony memorials which were erected on such occasions, Laban, in his Syriac dialect, imposed the name of Jegar-sahadutha upon the heap; and Jacob called it Galeed, both of which names have the same meaning of, THE WITNESS HEAP; but to the erect stone, the name of Mizpeh, THE WATCH, or WATCH

VOL. I.